Ed Harris, Amy Madigan to star in Geffen Playhouse's 'Jacksonian'

The Geffen Playhouse will bring six big acting, writing and directing names into a small space when it premieres Pulitzer winner Beth Henley’s latest, “The Jacksonian,” starting Feb. 8 in its Audrey Skirball Kenis Theater.

The cast announced Thursday includes Ed Harris (a four-time Oscar nominee), his wife, Amy Madigan (one Oscar nod), Bill Pullman (whose last major L.A. stage role was two years ago at the Taper as the besieged professor in David Mamet’s “Oleanna”) and Glenne Headly (the object of Steve Martin and Michael Caine’s attempted flimflammery in the film “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”).

Directing is Robert Falls, whose 25 years as artistic director of Chicago’s Goodman Theatre includes winning a best-director Tony award in 1999 for the Broadway transfer of the Goodman’s “Death of a Salesman.”

Henley's play shares its title with its setting, a seedy motel in Jackson, Miss. (her birthplace), circa 1964. Harris plays a dentist who moves in after becoming estranged from his wife, played by Madigan. Pullman owns the joint, and Headly tends bar for him. Not cast is the estranged couple’s daughter.